I changed the world.

After walking forward for a while, the group arrived at a huge basin. The basin looked enormous, at least several thousand meters in diameter, or even larger.

The group stood at the edge of the basin, looking down. Dr. James Wayne looked around and judged, "This should be a meteorite impact crater. Look, no wonder the surrounding terrain is so broken. There should be radial patterns all around. The inside is relatively steep, and the outer edge is a gentle slope. In the central area over there, there is a raised central peak. These features are typical of meteorite craters."

As members of the experimental ship, the group naturally had no shortage of knowledge in this area, and after a brief observation, they realized that the doctor was right.

"Doctor, where should we begin collecting ore for testing?" Andrews Lee asked.

“I suggest we head to the center. Generally speaking, the central peak area is the core of the impact and is likely to contain highly metamorphic minerals,” Dr. James Wayne concluded after a moment’s thought.

Dr. James Wayne's judgment was reasonable and well-founded, so the group did not linger and began to climb downwards.

The slope of the crater's edge is not steep, but relatively gentle, so the group did not have much difficulty moving around and could walk down without assistance.

After walking for about a kilometer, the slope began to become steeper. Fortunately, the gravity was not great here, and Tang Xianzong used his equipment to nail a high-strength alloy rope to the rock wall for assistance. The group held onto the rope and continued forward. After walking several hundred meters, they finally arrived at the relatively flat area at the bottom of the meteorite crater.

Volume Two: The Truth Hidden Behind the History Books: Chapter 1070 Completing the Mission

The group continued forward, gradually approaching the relatively core area of ​​the crater.

Just as the group breathed a sigh of relief, a sharp cry came from behind them again.

The cry was extremely piercing in the silent night, like weeping or the hooting of an owl.

The group was startled and looked behind them again. In the hazy environment, there seemed to be some small, shadowy creatures running around.

"You all continue, I'll go take a look," Tang Xianzong instructed the group before turning and walking away.

As an elite member of the Marine Corps, he moved extremely fast under the current gravity, carrying his weapon, and gradually disappeared from their sight.

The group glanced at Tang Xianzong's location every now and then with some concern, while simultaneously collecting ore from the bottom of the pit. The central peak was not far ahead, and this area was already in the relatively core region of the meteorite crater.

The crater contains a large amount of breccia, a mixture of rocks that appear to be glued together, as well as various other stones that are difficult to identify. Mary Amber even found some glass-like crystals, which she speculated were formed under high temperature and pressure during the meteorite impact.

Since it was unclear which ore was truly needed, or even if such a ore existed at all, the group collected various stones to conduct some testing.

Soon, a series of gunshots rang out in the distance.

The group stood up again and looked towards the direction from which the gunshots had come, their eyes filled with worry. Fortunately, Tang Xianzong's voice soon came through the communication channel, telling them not to worry.

Soon after, Tang Xianzong gradually appeared in the mist, carrying something in his hand.

His figure became clearer and clearer, and soon he arrived in front of everyone.

At this moment, he was holding a creature about the size of a wildcat on Earth, which was clearly dead.

"What is this?!" Everyone put down their work and gathered around.

"This is the creature that was making noise just now. I noticed it getting closer, and it seemed to be planning to attack. There were two of them. I shot and killed one, and the other one ran away..." Tang Xianzong waved the creature in his hand.

The creature, held by its tail in his hand, was clearly motionless and appeared to be dead.

This creature has four limbs and its body is covered with dense scales. These scales are small and strong, unlike fish scales, they are much finer and appear extremely thick. Like creatures on Earth, it also has eyes, but the eyes look extremely small and are hidden among the scales, presumably due to adaptive evolution caused by the planet's environment.

Mary Amber pried open the creature's mouth and found it contained many layers of densely packed, sharp teeth.

“This little thing’s teeth look like they’re good enough to eat meat; we need to be careful,” Mary Amber said after observing it.

"It's alright, one shot was enough to kill him." Tang Xianzong laughed. "I thought it was a pretty good specimen, so I brought it back. We can take it back to the starship."

“It is indeed a good specimen. Extraterrestrial life would definitely cause a sensation on Earth,” Mary Amber said with a smile, her tone also showing excitement. She had gained another subject for her research.

“There must be other species on this planet. In an environment where such a complex creature could have evolved, it couldn’t have existed in isolation…” Mary Amber said as she examined the creature’s corpse. At this moment, the monster’s corpse was still soft in the extremely low ambient temperature and had not been frozen solid.

“It seems to have some kind of way to combat the low temperature…” Mary Amber became even more interested after discovering this.

“Alright, Ms. Amber, we can take it with us and do research when we get back. We still have things to do right now,” Dr. James Wayne said from the side.

Mary Amber nodded, took out a bag, put the creature's corpse inside, the bag quickly contracted to form a vacuum, and then Mary put it into her backpack.

Afterward, the four continued to collect ore. Before long, they had collected a pile of ore. In addition, Dr. James Wayne took out a mechanical object that resembled a spinning top. After being thrown to the ground, this object started to spin automatically like a spinning top, and then drilled into the rock layer below like a tunnel boring machine.

A few minutes later, the machine re-emerged from the ground not far away. Dr. James Wayne opened the machine and took out a rock core.

He then moved to another position and began performing similar actions.

This machine is an automated drill that extracts core samples from the lower layers of rock; it's a common tool in space exploration. Because the team didn't know whether the tritium-rich area was on the surface or underground, they had to make various attempts when collecting samples.

About half an hour later, the four of them had basically finished collecting the mineral samples.

At this moment, Andrews Lee took out some parts from his bulky backpack, and the group began to assemble them.

This is a mineral element analyzer.

After the collected minerals were broken into appropriately sized particles, they were further crushed and tested using a testing instrument.

The entire process is completed by computer, and the data output speed is quite fast.

The final result was quite encouraging for everyone. The area had an extremely high tritium enrichment. Not only did most of the drilled rock cores contain a high proportion of tritium, but even some of the ores collected on the ground contained a considerable amount of tritium.

“We need to collect more of this kind of rock aggregate.” Dr. James Wayne showed a piece of dark-colored breccia in his hand. This rock, formed by cementing together various types of minerals, contained a significant amount of tritium.

Not all breccia is suitable, so after everyone collected the breccia, Dr. James Wayne had to screen it again. However, compared to having to drill into the ground or not finding any rich areas at all, this was already the best result.

After a targeted collection and screening, everyone's backpacks were full of ore, and the current task was considered complete. At this moment, they did not intend to linger and immediately decided to return to the multi-functional all-terrain vehicle.

"Guys, we're in luck. Let's head back now and get these ores to the starship first..." Dr. James Wayne chuckled and patted the huge package on his back. With the help of the mechanical exoskeleton, he didn't feel tired. However, after a long period of outdoor work, even with body temperature regulation, he still felt sticky all over in the enclosed exoskeleton working environment.

Volume Two: The Truth Hidden Behind the History Books: Chapter 1071 The Onset of Illness

After completing the ore collection work, the group did not linger and began their journey back with their respective bags on their backs.

At this moment, everyone had a smile on their face. It should be said that they were lucky this time. The bad situation they had worried about did not occur, and they completed their biggest task very smoothly.

The group retraced their steps and, with the help of ropes, climbed back up the pit wall.

After some effort, the group returned to the edge of the crater and began to walk back along the path they had come from.

At this moment, the giant planet overhead reflected the light of the star, casting a bright light onto the earth. From their position, even without a telescope, they could see the clear atmospheric circulation above the gray planet.

“What a beautiful place…” Dr. James Wayne looked up at the sky and exclaimed.

"Doctor, it's so cold. It's much colder here than back home," Andrews Lee said with a smile from the front of the group.

“It’s already quite good. With this kind of environment, we should be able to establish a planetary colony directly,” Mary Amber chimed in.

“The atmosphere here is suitable for human habitation. Perhaps, some of our descendants will be born here and regard this place as their home planet. Who knows…” Dr. James Wayne said as he walked forward.

“I don’t want my child to be born here, it’s too desolate here…” Andrews Lee sighed.

"Perhaps they will grant you a noble status. I've heard that various countries are formulating policies for expansion," Tang Xianzong added from the side. The people on the Mogen River were unaware of the economic crisis occurring on Earth. When they set sail, all the public opinion was discussing the upcoming interstellar age of exploration.

“Well… well, that’s not entirely out of the question…” Andrews Lee hesitated for a moment. “Perhaps there will even be fiefdoms, and our children will become nobles with fiefdoms…”

“Perhaps in the future, that will really happen, and humanity’s expansion will extend to countless planets…” Dr. James Wayne nodded.

“That might lead to war… just like it did two hundred years ago,” Mary Amber suddenly interjected.

"Who knows? That's all for the future..." Dr. James Wayne laughed.

“I agree with Ms. Amber’s words. Humanity should truly become a nation, instead of each country having its own plans and being unable to truly integrate as it is now…” Tang Xianzong suddenly said.

Thoughts similar to those of Tang Xianzong are not uncommon in the Earth Defense Force. Although the members of this force are recruited from retired soldiers of various countries' armies, in reality, due to the special nature of its operations, it has inevitably developed some idealistic ideas.

This is an army that has placed great emphasis on the spirit of sacrifice since its inception. From the very beginning, its hypothetical enemy has been an enemy that is almost impossible to defeat.

Its strategic objective is singular: to mount a resolute and uncompromising resistance for the continuation of the human race should humanity be attacked from deep space.

Therefore, for a considerable period of time, the goal of the Earth Defense Force was not even how to defeat the enemy, because even the most optimistic person knows that if aliens who can reach Earth, rather than being reached by Earth, are enemies, then their technology must be something that Earthlings cannot defeat.

Therefore, they devised various contingency plans to delay the enemy, and even came up with crazy plans such as detonating planets to create gravitational turbulence.

All of this has one purpose: to buy enough time for humanity's elite to evacuate their home planet.

To preserve the spark for humanity's resurgence.

Therefore, many in the Earth Defense Force advocate expanding the influence of the Human Alliance and, on this basis, establishing a federation or alliance of a national nature, so as to integrate all of humanity's power.

However, similar ideas have been suppressed, either openly or covertly, in various countries.

After Tang Xianzong finished speaking, everyone fell silent for a moment.

Finally, Andrews Lee smiled and said, "That's something big shots should decide. Speaking of which, our car will be here soon..."

"Cough cough... cough cough cough..." Before he could finish speaking, he suddenly lowered his head and began to cough violently.

This action startled the people around him. At this moment, no one thought about those unrealistic things anymore, and everyone focused their attention on Andrews Lee.

"Cough cough... My throat is a little itchy... cough cough cough cough..." Andrews Lee explained with difficulty, then coughed violently again.

At this moment, everyone's heart turned cold. Under normal circumstances, such a cough would not be a big deal, but this time it was different. They were all crew members who had come aboard the Mogenhe experimental ship, and they all knew that a terrible disease was spreading on the Mogenhe, a disease of unknown origin.

The initial symptom of this disease is a severe cough...

"We need to hurry," Tang Xianzong said, his tone noticeably lower.

Andrews Lee stopped speaking, but as he continued forward, he coughed incessantly, his voice echoing through the communication channel and making everyone's hearts sink.

Everyone knows this is a disease with an extremely rapid onset; judging from the current situation, it might only take ten days, perhaps...

After walking for a while, the group finally found their multi-purpose all-terrain vehicle. The vehicle was still there and seemed to be fine.

The group began to take off their backpacks and put them on the vehicle. These backpacks, which are fixed to the exoskeleton, are not easy to put on and take off; they must help each other in pairs.

Just then, a series of sharp cries came from the mist not far to the right rear.